It is important for a fisherman, when fishing in a tournament, to have a quick and easy way to cull fish by weight. There have been numerous markers on the market that attach to the fish to identify it by color to the fisherman. He records the color of marker and the weight of the fish on paper or in some other way.
In a Bass fishing tournament, the limit of a single fisherman is five fish, the limit for a team is seven fish, and salt water limits can be ten fish. Markers are often sold in sets of five or seven. When the limit number of fish is caught and put in the the live well, and the fisherman has caught another fish, it is time to start culling. When he weighs the next fish, he has no more markers left, with the sets of markers now available. If he determines that the fish is heavier than any one of his limit, he may want to keep it, but he can't get the fish into the live well quickly. He either has to hold on to the gasping fish, or let the poor fish flop around in the boat until he gets a marker off another fish. First, he has to choose the marker of the lighter fish, chase it around the live well and untangle the marker lines, unclip the fish and clip the marker on the new fish. Many of those markers now sold have a tendency to tangle.